Sam Grundwerg, a Florida native and attorney, has been named as Israel’s new consul general in Los Angeles. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who also serves as his country’s foreign minister, made the announcement on the evening of April 7.
Grundwerg joined the executive staff of the World Jewish Congress in 2010 and currently serves as director of WJC’s Israel branch. He is also a close friend of Ron Dermer, the ambassador to Washington, D.C., according to Haaretz.
Grundwerg, 43, lives with his wife and three children in Efrat, a West Bank settlement south of Jerusalem.
Born in Miami Beach, Grundwerg received a bachelor’s degree from Bar-Ilan University in Israel and a law degree from the University of Miami Law School. He is fluent in both English and Hebrew.
He practiced law for several years in Florida, with focus on the financial field, and, after making aliyah, worked for several large corporations in Israel.
Grundwerg will succeed the current consul general, David Siegel, who assumed the post for Southern California and seven southwestern states in August 2011.
Career foreign-service members are usually the appointees to Israeli diplomatic posts abroad, but exceptions are sometimes made for appointments of ambassadors and consuls general to such key posts as New York and Los Angeles.
In March, Netanyahu appointed Dani Dayan as consul general in New York after the Brazilian government rejected his proposed assignment as its ambassador, citing Dayan’s leadership of the West Bank settler movement
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